Tuesday, March 22, 2011

The rougher looking of the two bikes turns out to have the better motor and frame. Once I removed the Harley rear mudguard and the honda front mudguard, I the bike started to look less of a mess and more of a classic. I swapped the ape hangers for a set of triumph bars - not correct but more inspiring while I wheel it around to work on. The motor still has compression, and theres still oil in the tank so it turns over pretty nicely. I just need to figure out the wiring of the alternator contact breaker set up so I can see if she'll start. Wouldn't that be a change - A running motorcycle!

Friday, March 18, 2011

Picked up two 1958 barn fresh BSA B33's, pretty complete, albeit not all original or pretty. The 1st bike I plan on getting running, then do a full restoration when I get time. I'll ride her ugly I don't care. The second is for sale, a little rougher, or if no one wants it, it'll be parted out.

Seat is from an older b33, not sure if it's correct or not.

bars look like old italians, not original, kinda cool, but not very functional .

Saturday, March 12, 2011

After discovering there was a lot of play on the primary chain wheel on the clutch, I pulled all the guts from the primary case and discovered a badly work mainshaft. I called up a friend, who I recently met, that has a massive inventory of triumph parts. I asked him if he had the 5 speed mainshaft, which he did, so I drove over (20 minutes!) and picked it up along with new nuts and washers. Brilliant. Didn't have to go to ebay or wait for mail order, plus my friend charged a very fair price. An hour later I was rebuilding the trans - which only took three attempts.... the key is to gob lots of grease on the shift-dogs to hold them in place until you can get all the gears in place and the spindle through the three dogs and lock it up. Next up is inner and out gearbox reassembly and gear indexing. Thenreplace primary chain and alternator. If I don't find any other major problems I should be getting VERY close to having thi on the road. I really can't wait to ride this bike - OIF Triumphs aren't my favorite, but with a few aesthetic mods this bike is beautiful and hopefully should be reliable... well as reliable as a brit bike can be.

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

The crank in the donor engine was so rusted that it was impossible to get it out of the cases without doing damage to the threads and splines. Not a major problem, I knew the donor was seized up so I wasn't counting on the crank to be useable - though it would've been nice. I took the timing side engine bushing and compared it to the new "5ta" crank I snagged on the 'bay, but oh no, whats this? It's no a match. I think the crank I bought, listed as a 5ta is actually a 5T pre unit model, which is totally different. Argh!!!!!!!!!!